Oh No - not another detailing thread - 56K bye

[bstardchild]

Well sort of maybe and then again not quite

I went along to a beginners detailing day today with another RR'r who I will leave it up to him to admit to being there or not as he wishes.......

I'm not "into" detailing and in the last 25 years of car and bike ownership I've managed very well with - turtlewax shampoo, clean sponge and bucket and a leather to dry the car off, I've used various "polishes" from T-cut to colour matched stuff but I find the whole process a bit tedious

I will admit I like a clean car but there is "clean" and "so clean" I wouldn't want to drive it and where is the fun in that

What I would say is I have an open mind to most things and having been very impressed with some "Dodo Juice" waxes I tried a year or so back I hoped that I'd learn something usefull....... And I did!!!!

Anyway heres some pics from the day

First car a Corsa (bit filthy) caught me by surprise - it's a dark blue but I hardly had the camera ready before it changed colour as if by magic.....



Let the foam do the work



Jet wash down and then wash using a Lambswool mit and two bucket method.

I'm used to a two bucket wash - most of my cars are overweight saloons or coupes and I always need two buckets of soapy water to clean them properly but this was a different technique



One bucket soapy - one bucket clean plain water - wash from the soapy one and rinse the mit frequently in the clean one making sure all the dirt doesn't get transfered back to the car.

What I did like was both buckets had little grids in the bottom so the mit couldn't accidently pick up dirt from the bottom - never seen that before

This was a theme for the day - basically primary aim is to minimise scratching and swirls in paint from dragging contaminants around the paint

Next was a zero contact wash and I was ready this time ;D















Several pics as I had the camera on shoot several frames at a time - Andy's a fast worker ;D

Let the foam/detergent and TFR (Trafic Film remover) do it's job

Rinse



Then a non contact drying process was tried but we won't go there although it was food for thought ;D

I'm not sure is this is going to go down well here so I'll wait for some feedback I think - up to you all if you want more say so

[briandamaged]

Yea go for it BC......we used to use that Auto-Smart TFR to clean our wagons with when I worked for Intersport, brilliant stuff.

[sav]

Aye, show us some more.

I'm open minded about stuff like this as well.

[bstardchild]

OK a thumbs up so I'll post some more

Another car got a wash and this was to be the base car for the rest of the day



along with some "scrap" panels - well would you let a novice lose with a powertool and cutting/polishing compound on your car ;D

Not sure how well these shots will come out but many years ago I had a white car that had so many tar spots on it I spent a day with all sorts of chemicals trying to get them all shifted and to be honest none of them were very good and all required loads of elbow grease

This stuff was a spray on solvent and it was seriously good - I could get adicted to it real quick



I hope you can see it disolving the tarspots



and the trail down the bumper



We then moved on to clay bars and it was a hands on experience so no pics then it seemed a nice place to stop for lunch so we did ;D

Gordon Ramsey did the bar-Be-q and very nice it was too - note correct tools being used for the task



More shortly

[bstardchild]

So after lunch we moved onto cutting compounds, polishing compounds and finishing compounds and the pads to use with them and the two main types of machines used - here I was very interested as most of my cars look like ice skating rinks after heavy use and I've seen these marks removed by machine polishing

this is a Porter Cable (oscilating head)







It took a lot of fine scratches out of a very abused bonnet but left a lot of deeper ones in the paint

So then we had a demonstration of a DA (air tool very fine ocilations with a fine sanding pad) Wet sanding

Below the line polished above the line DA



It looked stuffed by the process but I could not believe the results that followed









I like this shot (From bottom to top)

Porter Cable - Polished

Wet Sanded

Porter Cable Polished after wet sanded



Yep thats not a tape line is the line of wet sanded paint that had been covered by the tape

[bstardchild]

So then there was a demonstation of the non ocilating polishing machine - I forget it's proper name and one thing was quickly very clear - heat is the number one enemy

With the porter cable the panels had always been warm after machine polishing but not hot

With the other machine after 15 secs in contact with the same place it could potentially damage the paint after 30 secs the pad started eating itself and one of the three marks in the centre is skin from my finger



Better close up



That panel was wrecked the clear coat had blistered and yellowed and it was a re-paint job

I was interested to see just how much a serious error could be re-covered - bottom line is I just know I will make a mistake so what could be done if I did

Wet sand in progress



Wet sand completed



I get to have a go

Slow speed to start to work the polish (damn these things move about and have a mind of their own!!!)



Spped up a bit (it's harder than it looks)



Keep working



Slow down



Almost finished



OK so never going to be perfect but provided I'm carefull I think I could have a go at my BMW





Thats all for now - we covered some other stuff like glass cleaning tyre dresing - interiors etc but the machine work was what I was really interested in

[Hirst]

I'm going to get one of those Porter Cables at some point, they seem to do a good job without as much risk as the heavy duty stuff. Probably not good enough for the professional, but I'm not a professional, I just enjoy tidying cars up! Last time I looked they were import only though.

Anyway, enjoyed that. Thanks for sharing.

P.S. Please can we make this the one thread about cleaning/polishing cars which doesn't turn into a "who washes their car the least" contest? Cheers.

[bstardchild]

May 11, 2008 0:28:02 GMT Hirst said:

I'm going to get one of those Porter Cables at some point, they seem to do a good job without as much risk as the heavy duty stuff. Probably not good enough for the professional, but I'm not a professional, I just enjoy tidying cars up! Last time I looked they were import only though.

Anyway, enjoyed that. Thanks for sharing.

I think the Porter cable is a good machine just requires a lot more work to get the best results

Big problem is buying one of those and then finding it doesn't do all you want and needing to upgrade - more expense

Glad you enjoyed it - I'm glad I shared the experiences of the day - there was a lot more information and stuff covered but no pictures means it never happened ;D

May 11, 2008 0:28:02 GMT Hirst said:

P.S. Please can we make this the one thread about cleaning/polishing cars which doesn't turn into a "who washes their car the least" contest? Cheers.

You know thats never gonna happen

[Hirst]

I must admit as a novice I'm a bit afraid of "proper" polishing machines due to how they can burn through the paint if you're not careful. I'm sure it isn't a big deal once you know what you're doing, but I don't really have any dodgy paintwork to practice on! The worst paint I've got is the Galant and that's far too good for me to be messing around with, too risky.

The Porter Cable seems like a good compromise for me, one up from hand-polishing at the least. Though I know for a fact I'll eventually work my way up through various machines, wasting lots of money in the process. It's what I do! I can't even pretend I won't do that.

And with regards to the anti-wash crew, I can live in hope I suppose.

[HoTWire]

I'm disgusted with how dirty my car is at the moment,.. Sadly the only chance I'm going to get to clean it will be the local power wash thing at a garage near here... Maybe I should see if some trader at JapFest wants to use the car as a demonstrator for their cleaning products.

I love a clean car,..

[keithyboy]

How pleased does she look that her special day out was to go and watch a load of blokes cleaning cars.

Out of interest, what detergent were they using in the pressure washer. I've yet to find anything that produces anywhere near as much foam as that.

[bstardchild]

May 11, 2008 7:04:16 GMT keithyboy said:

How pleased does she look that her special day out was to go and watch a load of blokes cleaning cars.

Oh how wrong you are ;D

She - Becca - came on her own and turned up in one of the sweetest MKII Golfs I have seen in a long while (Dark blue with polished 16 inch Merc rims - slammed stance on coilovers with a nice stretch on the tyres - whole host of really subtle mods to the car that you had to look twice to see and made you go wow) - she asked a lot of questions quietly and made a lot of notes - That lady is a real petrolhead and likes her cars to be spot on. I got the feeling that Becca also got a hell of a lot out of the day

May 11, 2008 7:04:16 GMT keithyboy said:

Out of interest, what detergent were they using in the pressure washer. I've yet to find anything that produces anywhere near as much foam as that.

Now you see that's why I should have made some notes - I didn't

it was a mixture of degreasant, traffic film remover and detergent but the foaming was created by an addition of a small quantity of a foaming agent - I think it was called "snow foam" which kinda makes sense and the lance and bottle were for the purpose.

[bstardchild]

Re the golf - I'm hoping that the other RR'r who went got some pics of her car - cos I stupidly didn't

[keithyboy]

There's a whole world out there that I know nothing about!

search.ebay.co.uk/search/search.dll?from=R40&_trksid=m37&satitle=snow+foam

[rmad]

Great thread. I actually quite like the fact that car cleaning has become a sport! Looks like an interesting day.

[bstardchild]

May 11, 2008 7:57:27 GMT keithyboy said:

There's a whole world out there that I know nothing about!

Ebay Snow Foam Search

Everyday is a school day ;D

[DarrenW]

An interesting read, thanks for that! ;D My Corsa hasn't been washed in two and a half years and it's all pink, but I did enjoy claying and waxing the Golf not long ago.

[bstardchild]

May 11, 2008 8:54:59 GMT DarrenW said:

An interesting read, thanks for that! ;D My Corsa hasn't been washed in two and a half years and it's all pink,

Ahh good old Flame Pink ;D I've got one like that

[simes]

That looks like Andy C doing the work, did he show up in his 205?
He's a member on 205gtidrivers - likes a clean car!!

[bstardchild]

May 11, 2008 10:11:25 GMT simes said:

That looks like Andy C doing the work, did he show up in his 205?
He's a member on 205gtidrivers - likes a clean car!!

unbeliveably clean 205 gti with an Mi16 heart transplant